Enabling Accounts Payable departments to add value and reduce cost using Oracle WebCenter Imaging

1. Enabling Accounts Payable departments to
add value and reduce cost using Oracle
WebCenter Imaging
Session 11411
Brad Storts and Jay Canupp
Axia Consulting

2. AXIA Consulting LLC
www.axiaconsulting.net
AXIA Consulting is a premier consulting firm that provides technology and business consulting services to local middle-market and
Fortune 500 companies as well as government agencies. Focused on real, business oriented results, AXIA consistently delivers
tremendous value by accomplishing projects on-time and on-budget while achieving our client’s strategic, operational, and technology
objectives.
Brad Storts Brad.Storts@axiaconsulting.net
Brad has 20 years of experience in technical and application implementation and managing ongoing operations. He has lead
technical projects including creating a disaster recovery solution, re-architecting an enterprise storage environment, and upgrading
from Windows XP to Windows 7. He has also managed application projects such as implementing Oracle’s Governance, Risk, and
Compliance software suite and Oracle’s WebCenter Imaging. He has helped build project management office capabilities,
successfully leading efforts to build processes to centrally manage IT projects and heading up several software and RFP selections
and project cost/benefit estimates.
Jay Canupp Jay.Canupp@axiaconsulting.net
Jay is an accomplished senior consultant with over fourteen years experience serving in various roles on Enterprise Resource
Planning (ERP) teams and Business Intelligence projects within the Utilities, Software, Manufacturing, Insurance, and Public Sector
industries. He has experience with Oracle Purchasing, Financials, Inventory and Human Resources. He is a strong functional analyst
with deep technical skills allowing him to quickly resolve elusive application issues for himself and his team members. Jay is an
experienced business process analyst in supply chain management as well the accounting processes with deep experience in
international implementations. He is also a PMP certified project manager. Jay has also lead multiple enterprise reporting projects
using a variety of tools such as OBIEE, Discoverer, FSG and Business Intelligence Publisher.

3. Abstract
Oracle WebCenter Imaging includes complete document lifecycle support. This presentation will review the
business problems this technology solves, the technical requirements and functional capabilities of Oracle
WebCenter Imaging, and some tips and tricks on implementation. This presentation is based on a recent
implementation at a Midwest utility that processes 7,000 invoices per month.
Objectives
Objective 1: Provide an overview of WebCenter Imaging functionality.
Objective 2: Discuss the business value in capturing documents, workflow routing, and automating data
entry.
Objective 3: Provide high level information on implementing WebCenter Imaging.
Objective 4: Answer any questions on WebCenter Imaging implementation and support.

4. High Level Agenda
• Review Accounts Payables invoice processing
• Discuss Oracle WebCenter Imaging components
• Lessons learned / best practice for Oracle WebCenter Imaging implementations
http://www.oracle.com/us/legal/index.html

7. Manually keying invoices Invoices read using optical character
recognition, supplier lookup is
automated
Invoice lost in the approval process Invoices routed through a workflow,
with daily email reminders for approval
as well as reporting on invoices taking
longer than normal
Documentation that invoice was
approved
Invoice approval stored as well as
comments and workflow tracing
Pulling invoices after processing Invoice images are stored
electronically, attached as a link to the
Oracle E-business suite record, with
searching capabilities on invoice
images
Invoices processed increases yet AP
departments cannot add staff
Invoice processing becomes more
automated, speeding entry
Oracle WebCenter Imaging provides a
solution to many AP challenges:

8. Oracle Document Capture
• scans the image
• fixes the image (delete unneeded pages, rotate pages, crop, etc.)
• Allows for indexing (basic information about the document)

9. Oracle Forms Recognition
• Reads the invoice and attempts to automatically gather information
• Invoice #, date, purchase order, vendor, individual lines
• Creates a payload to write to EBS open interface table
• Creates a payload to write to BPM
ABC Industries
ABC Industries

10. Oracle Forms Recognition
• Vendor Search: Can search on company name, any part of company
address, internal and external vendor ids
• Purchase Order: can look up order information using the purchase order
• Can read and populate information about each invoice line
• Can run in learning mode to increase chances an invoice is read properly

11. Imaging and Process Management
• stores images and allows for searching, printing, downloading
• Content Management functions

12. Oracle BPM Worklist
• Routes the invoices for approval
• Allows AP clerks to organize work

13. Oracle EBS
• Invoices are automatically entered into AP from the oracle AP
interface tables
• Invoice image is attached to the invoice header record
• Invoice tracing is attached to the invoice header record

14. Oracle Business Activity Monitor
• reporting tool for BPM Worklist

15. Implementation
• Requirements
o What documents to send through this process?
o What should the workflow be?
o For your highest volume suppliers, consider using batch processes
(ERS, AP Open interface table loads)
o Don’t spend too much time working on requirements without first
standing up the solution – you need to understand the out of the
box configuration and see it first hand

16. Scanners
• Scanning station
o Took an image of one station for backup / redeployment
o Maintenance kit
o Dedicated scanning station (faster and cleaner than multifunction
device)
o Xerox Documate 262i scanner work well as an example

17. Oracle Document Capture
• Foxit PDF Reader over Adobe
o Reads PDF’s faster
o Less intrusive software update process
o Less likely to “freeze”
• ODC cannot read excel spreadsheets that are password protected
• Embedded graphics in the signature of an email (image001.gif)
• Embedded emails (outlook icon)
• Reroute exceptions to an exceptions mailbox
• Monitor the log for errors:

18. Oracle Forms Recognition
• Sends invoices to the IPM_VALIDATION supplier if it
can’t find the true supplier
• Consolidate lines to a single invoice line
• Pass network id and tie to an Oracle id
• Add Vendor Id, Vendor Site, and Org ID to vendor list
• Require Org ID / Company Code – if a purchase
order is entered on the wrong company it must be
deleted and re-entered
• Remote application publishing for running OFR from a
server (ran OFR verifier stations from a virtual server,
used an MSI package to run from the user’s desktop)
• AXF import – may need to adjust the Oracle
instructions for permissions to the AXF objects

19. BPM Worklist
• Purge and the SOA INFRA table; also monitor this table for growth
to eliminate a table space error
• Occasionally will need to restart a workflow
• Initial problems mailing to a large list
• Initial issues with displaying many lines of history
• Firefox to read long comments (IE limits pop up)

20. Oracle E-Business Suite
• Created a default hold code to force approval
• Default the customer registration number, notify on OFR rejections
• IPM holds – default does not allowing accounting, suggest you check
to allow accounting
• IPM_Validation default supplier: for each supplier site, set up the
supplier site as ‘PAYEE’ under payment details

21. Testing
• Pull lots of different kinds of invoices: service v material, po’s with
releases, different orgs, pre-approved v approval required, debit credit
memo’s, different suppliers, overmatched po’s, invoices without a po
• After loading invoices through OFR, use SQL to pull invoice headers
and details lines and compare to invoices entered manually on a field
by field basis
• Run invoices through the entire process (pay invoices, create
accounting entries, see projects updates, close the AP month)

22. Business Process
• Vendor invoice formatting makes a big deal
• Put a purchase order on the invoice (a correct one)
• Keep invoices “clean”
ABC Industries
ABC Industries
ABC Industries

23. Business Process (Continued)
• Process Improvements are key
• Train approvers to respond quickly to get discounts
• Approval process may not follow the rules
• Look for opportunities in improving the process, not just installing
software
• You may need to clean up some vendor setup for purchasing and pay
sites; manually you select the vendor pay site but with OFR it can be
automatically pulled from the purchase order – which might have the
wrong pay site if it is attached to the correct purchasing site

24. Important Metrics
• When using OFR we achieved a hit rate of 80% on “clean” invoices. Hit
rate greatly depends on the invoice format.
• Invoice data entry time can be cut by more than half but not for all
suppliers. Some invoices may be better suited for “key from image”.
For example may professional services invoices can include detail that
is difficult for OFR to handle.
• Overall invoice cycle time were reduced by as much as 40% (some
suppliers). Bottlenecks are more visible to supervisors and managers
allowing them to take action before an invoice discount is lost or an
invoice goes past due.

25. Architecture

26. Oracle EBS
• Remember to purge the open interface table

27. Questions?
Comments?

28. THANK YOU
Brad Storts Brad.Storts@axiaconsulting.net
Jay Canupp Jay.Canupp@axiaconsulting.net